What more precious than all treasures

Once there was a king who noticed a hard-working slave among his subjects and had him summoned before his throne. The king told his slave that from then on, he was to be in-charge of his treasure room. Of course, there had to be people in the palace who frowned upon the idea. But the slave-appointee went about his daily chores the best way he could. Then his detractors noticed that everyday around midday, he would enter the treasure room, a folded sack slung on his shoulder. They would snoop on him, and started a gossip that this former slave was stealing piece by precious piece, from the trusting, nay-naive-king!

When the king learned of this betrayal, he, too, snooped on the traitor.

And this is what he saw: As usual, at midday, his slave-appointee would enter his treasure room, take out from his sack a worn-out garment slaves wore, take off his new tunic, and put his old garment on, look at himself in the mirror, then speak to his image: "You, lucky guy, NEVER, ever forget you were once a miserable slave!"

Then he would take his slave garment off, put it into the familiar sack, and put back on his new tunic, then leave the treasure room.

Needless to say, the king had him summoned before the throne again. This time, the whole congregation was all ears for the king's pronouncement. The king place his hand on the former slave's head, and announced that from then on he was to be in-charge of this treasure room FOR LIFE! And added, "I may be king here, but you have the the heart of a king!"

I like this story so much for the happy ending. We all love a happy ending. But what I love more is for the real reason Mohammad Ali told it to his daughter:

"Here's this proud and powerful king who had the wisdom and the honesty to acknowledge a greatness more precious than all his royal treasures."

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